Right, it's 2023, and every new year is basically an anniversary for our church anyway, so those of you that weren't here at the beginning,
we basically started meeting regularly, weekly, actually on a Saturday, not because we'd started getting conned by Seventh Day Adventist type nonsense,
because some of us were still attending various churches in the country, and we started trying to get our services nice,
and as our pastor wanted them, we said we could start meeting, and we were regularly meeting on the Saturday, going soul winning,
and that actually started on the 2nd of January, the year before last, so that was two years ago.
It's a funny thing, because in six weeks I'll probably just re-preach this sermon anyway, because it's another anniversary sermon,
but we are up to two years now, and the last year itself has been really eventful, and not just for our church,
but also for life in general around this country, hasn't it? There's been a lot going on.
If you think at the beginning of last year, people were still worrying about getting a compulsory vaccine,
and thinking are they going to be able to ever live normally again without getting this crazy vaccine,
and there was just all this stuff, and what a change just happened in the last year with that.
I hope everyone did hold out, because having done that and having some faith with it,
we're now just kind of back to normal life, going I'm glad I didn't get that vaccine.
Crazy, wasn't it? But for some people it got pretty hairy with their jobs and things like that,
but there was obviously the uncertainty about compulsory vaccines.
We've seen in the last year, we saw kind of fairly early, I think at least maybe it was spring last year,
was it, when war broke out in the Ukraine, and that's obviously been a scary situation for many,
and a lot of worrying about what can come from that and the consequences with that.
We've seen a bit of a financial crash as well, obviously post-COVID and current war and everything else,
so that's obviously affected a lot of people. We've had a new king here, haven't we?
The queen died in the end, got a new king, and it seemed like we had about three prime ministers
within the time of the pomp and the ceremony, I think, wasn't it?
I think within that time we went through a few.
But look, all of that really is kind of not really that important, is it?
And some of it's been quite amusing, there's been obviously an apparent easing of the pandemic recently,
some of that stuff it's worth keeping abreast of, but fortunately for us,
our year isn't measured by the craziness in the world, is it?
Our year should be measured by what's happened at Shaw Foundation Baptist Church UK, isn't it?
I mean, that's what it's all about. What's happened with God's church?
What's happened with God's church in the UK, Shaw Foundation Baptist Church?
Well, you know, it's funny, looking back at this, I started looking back at this and thinking,
wow, it's been a big year, actually.
In the first week of January last year, we celebrated a thousand salvations.
That's massive, isn't it?
We celebrated a thousand salvations in the first week of January last year.
And that was a big deal, wasn't it?
That was big news. We were, you know, for me, that was big.
And look, a lot of churches bigger than us don't have as receptive a kind of, you know,
a field as we do, that harvest in front of us is receptive.
And yeah, I know we've moved out of Southend and we're here.
And look, the soul winning still on a Sunday is receptive.
And, you know, the midweek stuff, we're still getting a lot of salvations up the road from here.
And look, people want to get saved in this nation.
We reached a thousand salvations in January and we've carried on, obviously, through that.
In February, we had our first year anniversary for when our church was officially a church.
That was February the 14th, coming up to two years ago now.
With that first anniversary, we had 27 salvations in Brixton, which is a good soul winning marathon now.
There were 33 around Europe.
So we had lots of different soul winners around different nations of Europe all joined in with that as well.
Ended up with another 33 salvations.
It was really exciting for many and kind of just put people,
I think it just reminded people of all these people out there still, you know, that still want to serve the Lord,
still want to go out soul winning and not necessarily with churches to send them out.
And then we also that day had a record attendance of 77 in the morning on our anniversary and 73 in the evening.
And if you remember how small that upstairs room was, I don't even know how we got them in there.
77, because I remember at first when it was quiet, we were like, this is big.
And then as the church was filling and filling, we're thinking this is pretty small actually, isn't it, up here.
Obviously the way it worked, we had to have that back section for sort of a, it ended up being an overspill,
having been a sort of mother baby area.
It just became an overspill and people having to watch it through the glass of it.
And look, that was a big day.
That was a big day.
March was a bit quieter.
Now there was Mother's Day and the usual end of the month marathon,
but we did have one of our, we did have our first eviction of the year in March.
And it was a guy called Costa who had never actually been to the church.
So that was quite cool anyway.
He was like an online eviction, wasn't he?
And that was kind of the first one of the year.
That kind of set the scene a little bit there.
April, we then hit our next record, 79 in our Easter Sunday morning service.
79 upstairs, that was the record upstairs in there.
And they were, I don't know, I think we had some people coming through the roof with that one.
It was something else, wasn't it?
Again, I don't know how we got 79 people.
I think we had kids on laps and stuff and, you know, people were just kind of squeezing through the door.
But then in May, we added the downstairs of our old building.
So if everyone remembers that.
Those of you that worked on the downstairs probably still have nightmares about that.
It was kind of because, you know, I like to set targets and I'm a bit of a time optimist.
Some people who know me well know that.
My wife knows this as well.
I'm always very optimistic.
I mean, I like to call it positive about how much time I need to get things done.
And I kind of set a target and I was doing sort of end up being about 16 hour days down there.
But we got it done and we got it done and suddenly we moved downstairs.
We kind of destroyed a load of walls and, you know, did a lot of other stuff.
Built a kind of a decking backdrop and stage.
It was a lot of work.
But we ended up moving down there.
We needed that, yeah, because 79, like I said, I don't think that would have lasted very long
before people were probably, you know, maybe falling sick during the services and stuff.
So we moved downstairs and that was great, wasn't it?
That was lovely to suddenly have that big space and it kind of got me used to as well
because it had to wrap around quite a lot with that, you know, the shape of the room.
So it kind of got me used to kind of preaching like this and then preaching like this.
When you watch some of those sermons, all you can do is, like, it can make you a bit dizzy watching, you know.
But that was pretty cool to add that downstairs.
And then in June, we started our Wednesday evening services.
And, you know, that's been a great addition, isn't it?
And we were never permanent with that building.
So we were kind of didn't start the Wednesdays, didn't start the Wednesdays.
And eventually we thought, OK, we've got the downstairs now.
It was supposedly going to be more permanent, although we found out it wasn't.
But so we started the Wednesday evening services.
And we also broke our attendance records with 85 in the morning on Sunday the 12th, just a random Sunday.
I think it was anything particularly special about Sunday the 12th of June.
We had 85 down there and 82 in the evening.
OK, that's a lot of people, isn't it, for what was, again, a new church.
And then on the 17th, we had a wedding as well.
So we had, you know, a wedding.
And yeah, that was a pretty big month, June.
Then in July, we moved to this new church building.
And in the same month as moving to this new church building.
And again, that was pretty exciting stuff and working on this and getting this ready.
We also kicked out half the church as well.
So that was a pretty eventful month.
It was funny because I'm not trying to say I predict these things, but I remember saying a while back, I say,
it's when we move, I reckon that's when, like, eventually this will all come to a kind of head.
And sure enough, it was. It was within a couple of weeks.
And yeah, we ended up drastically reducing the numbers here whilst moving into a nice big space.
So that wasn't obviously planned.
But OK, in August, I had a trip out to Poland and baptised 63 people in Poland.
That was immense. Just absolutely amazing.
Sixty three relatively new believers.
Some maybe have been saved for a little while waiting for baptism in Poland.
And there's hopefully a church coming to Poland. I think that's looking like it's going to come this year now.
So the idea was to just kind of baptise and get them spurred, you know, excited, spurred on for a church.
And that was a great event. So that was that was in in August.
And and what was even for me more exciting about that is we had a plane to catch as well.
It was all very tightly planned. So it wasn't kind of 63 relaxing baptisms.
It was like, you know, I thought I'd have to do one with my feet just to try and get them all done.
But we got that done, literally changed straight in the car to the airport onto the flight.
So that was pretty good. And then in September, we had our pastor come for the second time.
And look, again, that was a big deal. We were thinking, well, now that he's come once, are we going to get him over here again?
Because don't forget, there are certain people that are banned from this country.
Yeah. And, you know, obviously our type of church and preaching the whole Council of God, sadly, you know, some pastors get banned from coming here.
But fortunately, it wasn't. And we managed to have our pastor out here preaching for us again.
It was great to have him over here again. And obviously we had visitors in, you know, from Verity.
We had we had a visitor. We had visitors from steadfast as well.
And that was just great, wasn't it, to have these different people come to our church and meeting some of the other brethren from over over in the U.S.
and obviously with restrictions. So that was that was another great month.
And then October, as you can see, I was thinking, what happened in October?
And it started getting a bit quieter. We got a church minibus.
We got a church minibus in October. The big time now.
You can tell a good church by a minibus. You made it when you got a minibus.
I do need to get it sign written as well, but maybe in the summer with that.
So we got a church minibus, which again has made a big difference, made a big difference.
So when it was just at the point where, you know, I was talking to brother John and brother Andre about Sundays,
and it was really hard getting people out, you know, the non drivers and those, you know,
with maybe ladies and kids were kind of going with other ladies and adults, you know, were going.
So the husbands were going maybe not with the kids in the car, things like that.
It's becoming a bit of a logistical nightmare. We'd knocked every door in walking distance.
And then and now we've got a minibus and it's obviously helped as well with the journeys to and from the church,
from the from the train station. And then November.
Well, we had a ton of birthdays. November was like birthday month. So that's that's what I got for you for November.
And then in December, baby Enoch was born.
Another addition and to brother Colin and sister Anna there.
And and we had our first kids carol concert. That was that's the first time we've had a kids carol concert.
And I thought that went brilliantly. And obviously, you know, we've had an eventful eventful December.
So all of that, all of that, though, wouldn't have been possible without everyone here.
That's been such a help. Yeah. You know, pretty much everyone here.
And, you know, from, you know, and obviously there are some some set jobs and roles that we couldn't have done it without.
But just being here as well, you know, and obviously, you know, the music team.
So thank you to the music team. And I want to mention this because I don't think many people realize this.
But Vanessa only started learning the piano two years ago.
How when was it? It was as the church started pretty much, wasn't it?
So in the last two years, how many how many hymns you now got?
Sixty something hymns. And she doesn't read one of them by music.
So 60 hymns in a memory bank that she just sits down and plays by memorizing them.
That's impressive, right? I want to take it to the casino one day as well.
I reckon she can. I'm joking. I'm kidding.
But that's the memory, isn't it?
And how greatly she's played. And, you know, like that's a lot of work as well.
A lot of dedication and stuff that goes on behind the scenes. So thank you.
And John as well. And thank you for all the work with the music and the Bible readers.
You know, it's not some for some others who have tried to do that as well to stand up behind here and read the Bible is hard.
Right. And it's difficult and to read it clearly and to get up here and and not have the voice fluttering or anything else.
And everyone that's read the Bible here, we thank you.
Look, it's not it doesn't go unnoticed that the the money collectors encounters.
That's not always, you know, the easiest thing at the end of a service.
You kind of especially some who are getting on the train and, you know, when everyone else is drinking teas and coffees and, you know, chatting away,
they're locked in the office, you know, counting those pennies and, you know,
and arguing about whether it was, you know, this much or that much.
It's a lot of work. And we thank you, everyone that's got involved with that.
And obviously the people that don't always see, they always get a third witness to it as well, that we don't always see goes in there.
And thank you for those people that are just willing to go and help and get involved with those sort of things that come in.
And knowing that, look, this church, everyone knows or most people know the rule here that to get involved in the jobs of the church requires wearing a tie.
And thank you for those of you that turn up with a tie, knowing that you're likely to get asked to do a job like that, you know, so thank you for that.
The video guys, you know, not everyone wants to sit behind a video screen and all the work that's gone into that as well.
You know, and, you know, we've got obviously John, Dan and Max have been rotating with that and it's been a lot of work getting all the hymns on there.
We've got for me, I think we've got, you know, the best live service out there.
And we've got, you know, all the hymn music's coming up.
I love the fact that it's a congregational sound as well, that there's not kind of, no offence, John, because John's a nice singer, but not just a song leader, you know, that you could hear at the front there.
And I just, I love our live, so I think they're great, you know, and we have a lot of people that can't necessarily get here.
It's not, we're not trying to say it's an alternative, but there are some that can't get here every week for many reasons.
And we've got a great, great live stream out there.
So thank you for your work, guys, with that.
The ushers as well.
Again, not always the easiest job, sitting at the back there getting, you know, and there's other jobs they have to do.
Sometimes they have to turf out people that they've been friends with at the church.
You know, being an usher isn't always easy.
Yeah, there's the exciting times as well.
Kind of like a fireman, isn't it, as well?
We like firemen, ain't she?
How dare they relax sometimes.
But look, when they're called into action, they have to get into action, don't they?
And suddenly they're kind of surrounding families and telling them they're going to get turfed out if they don't move out.
And things like that, let alone being ready to deal with things on the door, just being there in the cold at the front door.
And, you know, all the work.
So thank you again to the ushers with all the work they've done over the last year.
The sole winning captains.
It's been, again, a lot of work.
Yeah, that's a lot of work.
A lot of just, just week in, week out, whether it's the times in the week or whether it's a Sunday, that's a lot of work.
A lot of work, planning routes.
And it's, you know, and again, sometimes it can go unnoticed by people, can't it?
The amount of work that goes into stuff like that.
Thank you for that, sole winning captains.
All the help with the manual work around the church.
There are people that have helped me just get on with stuff, whether it's climbing on roofs and then being pointed out by a roofer that we could fall through at any minute.
Like the fifth time.
We're up there.
And just all this sort of stuff, you know, there's been a lot of work that's gone around here and in the last building as well.
And thank you to everyone that's helped out with that.
The drivers.
We now have minibus drivers, people giving lifts to people.
Thank you for that.
That's not, you know, again, it's not always what you want to do first thing in the morning, last thing in the evening and taking them out, sole winning and everything else.
Also the photographers.
And then, by the way, if anyone's wondering with that, they're coming hopefully next week or two.
We're just getting the editing as well with that.
Father Max is finishing off.
So we've got now, you know, something we'd like to do and perfect each year and give everyone a chance to portrait photo here.
And everyone that's been out sole winning.
That thousand salvations from the beginning of the year and the 800 odd this year wouldn't be possible without everyone that's just persevered.
It's just come along, whether it's marathons, Sundays, midweek and just gone out and preached the gospel.
And thank you to everyone and silent partners, kids, kids, like I say, many times kids make it so much easier, so much more receptive.
They make it so much more confident when we're preaching to maybe younger people and sometimes kids themselves.
Thank you to all of you and just the church and people coming here.
It's just made this possible.
People being here in this church, coming along on a Sunday morning, you know, some of you it's come rain or shine and barring illness.
You know, we want you here as much as possible.
Thank you to everyone for that.
And then last of all, you know, although he's not here, thanks to our pastor.
And he didn't have to do this.
He didn't have to take a chance.
He didn't have to do any of that.
It just gave him a load of extra work and extra travel and everything else.
And he doesn't gain from it in any way, barring spiritually from just planting another church.
And we thank you.
You know, we thank our pastor for that as well.
And it's been a big year.
But does that mean it's now time to high five, reminisce and talk about 2022 for years to come?
And I'm sorry if I've missed anything there or anyone.
Did I mention the cleaners, by the way?
I don't think I mentioned the cleaners.
I did have it here.
Cleaners as well.
All the ladies that have, you know, just after services.
And the way it works, because we're not just all local to this church.
It's not maybe so easy to have a separate cleaning time.
Just after services, just cleaning, tidying, just getting on with stuff, mopping floors.
It's a big floor to do now, isn't it?
And all that work, again, it doesn't go unnoticed.
There's just been a lot done.
I don't think I missed anyone else off my list here.
So thank you, everyone.
But like I said, it's not time to just reminisce about 2022, is it?
We can have a quick look back at it.
We can learn a lot from it.
But it's time to move forward.
Paul said this in Philippians 3, and we're going to look at verse 13 and 14 quickly.
He said, brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended, but this one thing I do,
forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth unto those things which are before.
I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
And the title of my sermon today is Reaching and Pressing into 2023.
Reaching and Pressing into 2023.
I'd like to pray before we continue.
Father, thank you.
Thank you for this church.
Thank you for the last year.
So much has happened in that year.
Thank you for all the blessings you've given us.
Thank you for helping us.
Thank you for giving us this church.
Thank you for everyone that's here, everyone that's helped out in the various ways they have, Lord.
And I pray right now, just help me to preach this sermon,
to help encourage people to want to keep working for you,
help you just preach it clearly and boldly, Lord, and accurately,
and just fill with your spirit, Lord.
In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
So what's Paul talking about here?
Well, this passage of scripture starts a bit further back to make real sense of it.
So we're going to look from verse one in Philippians chapter three.
Philippians 3, one says, Finally, my brethren,
rejoice in the Lord to write the same things to you.
To me, indeed, is not grievous, but for you it is safe.
Beware of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of the concision.
And we saw this come to life more than ever this year, didn't we?
And look, this is a reminder time and time again in scripture.
So often, I mean, just preaching through any book of the Bible,
you're just going to see these sort of warnings time and time again.
It's a very real warning in scripture.
And I'll be honest, I am wary of people that try and play this down.
I'm wary of people that want to just kind of just go,
oh, you know, let's not, we don't want to talk about this sort of stuff.
Because that's weird, isn't it?
Because it's such a theme in the Bible.
It's something that we're constantly warned about.
Yeah, we don't want to be constantly questioning everyone in the church,
but it is something that we have to be aware of, don't we?
It goes on in verse three.
For we are the circumcision which worship God in the spirit
and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh.
Though I might also have confidence in the flesh,
if any other man thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh,
I am more.
Circumcise the eighth day of the stock of Israel,
of the tribe of Benjamin,
and Hebrew of the Hebrews was touching the law of Pharisee,
concerning zeal, persecuting the church,
touching the righteousness which is in the law, blameless.
So Paul's saying that the saved have no confidence in the flesh,
yet he would have more reason than most to have confidence in the flesh,
wouldn't he?
He's not saying that he was sinless,
but that he dotted the i's and crossed the t's,
likely brought all the right sacrifices and offerings and everything else,
and just, you know, he did exactly as he was meant to do following the law.
But again, but what things, he says in verse seven,
but what things were gained to me, those I counted, loss for Christ.
Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss
for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord,
for whom I have suffered the loss of all things,
and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ.
He's saying that none of that stuff is of any value
when it's compared to faith in Christ, isn't he?
Verse nine, and be found in him,
not having mine own righteousness which is of the law,
but that which is through the faith of Christ,
the righteousness which is of God by faith.
And that's the only righteousness which counts
when it comes to salvation, isn't it?
The righteousness which is of God by faith.
Verse 10, that I may know him,
and the power of his resurrection,
and the fellowship of his sufferings being made conformable unto his death,
if by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead.
So Paul's saying that he wants to just know Jesus Christ
in the ultimate ways by following in his footsteps.
Going through the sufferings, when you go through things
that Jesus Christ and others in the Bible,
it's kind of like you get to know him even more, don't you?
You really start to understand the Christian life
and ultimately through the persecutions
and some of the sufferings that can come with it
is when you really get to know Jesus Christ.
Even unto death, he's saying here, but of course only with that resurrection.
Attain here is to arrive at.
Paul's saying that he's happy to follow him to death
as long as that includes the resurrection.
Verse 12 says, not as though I had already attained,
either already perfect, but I follow after,
if that I may apprehend that,
for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.
So he's saying that he hadn't got there by those things
that he listed in verses three to six.
That didn't get him saved.
That's not why he's attained unto the resurrection.
He wasn't already perfect or complete is another word for that.
It's that he's following Christ's eternal life.
He'll seize, take hold.
Yeah, that's what he's talking about here a bit
because that's what Jesus Christ has seized, taken hold of for him.
Yeah, okay.
Or of him for.
So verse 13 says,
brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended,
but this one thing I do,
forgetting those things which are behind are reaching forth
unto those things which are before.
So he's saying it's not my own righteousness that's got it.
Yeah, I've forgotten all of those previous works.
I'm reaching forward to what's in front of me.
Verse 14 says I press toward the mark
for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
So Paul said that he's pressing on.
He said in verse 13 that he's reaching forward.
Yeah, what for?
Obviously not talking about earning it, okay?
Salvation, in terms of salvation, verse nine said
it'd be found him not having mine own righteousness
which is of the law,
but that which is through the faith of Christ,
the righteousness which is of God by faith.
So obviously you need to look at the whole passage together here.
I could imagine someone could try and preach a work
salvation message from this,
but when you look at it together,
he's obviously not preaching that, is he?
He's forgetting those past works of the flesh
and focusing on the things of heaven, isn't he?
Verse 15 says let us therefore as many be perfect,
be thus minded, and if it in anything ye be otherwise minded,
God shall reveal even this unto you.
So he's saying forget your past works of righteousness,
make sure your faith is in Christ,
a truth which God clearly reveals to us.
Verse 16, nevertheless whereto we have already attained,
let us walk by the same rule, let us mine the same thing.
So although you've already got saved,
let's still focus on reaching forward, yeah?
Let's still focus on reaching forward.
But perhaps for me where verse 14 said
I press toward the mark for the prize of high calling
of God in Christ Jesus.
Maybe Paul's reaching for the rewards for those crowns,
for the treasure in heaven to be called like thou good
and faithful servant, to be achieving things
for our Lord and Saviour.
That for me is what he's reaching towards,
what he's striving for.
Because the Christian life isn't just about salvation, is it?
That's the easy bit.
Salvation is the easiest bit, it's so easy.
I mean all you have to do is believe in the Lord Jesus Christ
and you're saved.
But there's a lot more than that, isn't there,
in the Christian life?
If you want to live for God, if you want to live for Christ,
if you want to follow the Lord Jesus Christ,
you want to live properly, you want to try and follow the word of God.
It's a lot more than just turning up on a Sunday morning, isn't it?
Is it just ticking a box and turning up on Sunday?
No, that's not the Christian life, is it?
It's not just about free to thrive.
Oh, well, I come Wednesday, Sunday morning, Sunday evening.
That's it, done it.
But that's not the Christian life, is it?
That's not the Christian life.
Soul winning, look, soul winning's great,
but that doesn't mean you've made it in the Christian life.
Bible reading and active prayer life,
getting sin out of your life.
And all those things are important, yeah,
but that's not what he's talking about here.
The Christian life is about pressing on, isn't it?
It's about reaching forward.
It's about striving for the Lord, doing more for God,
putting yourself out there saying, here am I, send me, isn't it?
It's saying, look, I'm here for you, Lord,
what do you want me to do?
It's thy will, not mine.
That's how we want to live, that's how we should live.
Look, we're going to fail at that many days of the week,
but that's every new morning.
You know, we should be striving for that.
We should be saying, look, God, I want to serve you,
I want to do things for you, I want to reach forward,
I want to strive, I want to press on for you.
Because it's easy to look back at past achievement,
whether it's before or after salvation.
Here Paul's looking at all these things he did before,
but even when it's after salvation, it's so easy, isn't it,
to look back, you know, well, I don't drink anymore.
I don't smoke. What an achievement.
Look at me, what a great Christian I am now.
You know, I gave up whatever addiction.
And look, great, good on you.
You know, good on you, you've done that.
But that doesn't mean you've made it.
That's not something to, well, at least I've done that,
I'm better than whoever else.
We always find someone worse than us, can't we?
The work salvationists always just find someone worse than them
and convince themselves, well, they must be good enough.
It's very easy to do that.
I've been in this few soul-winning marathons,
how about that, after salvation?
Well, I remember, you know, that day I went to that soul-winning marathon
and I really got a lot of salvations that day.
You know, is that really making it?
I've read the Bible X amount of times.
Well, I've done it ten times, now I could probably cut down a bit now.
You know, I've reached a magic number, I could be a pastor,
you know, whatever it is.
But what are you reaching forth to?
So you might have done all of that, but what is it,
what are you going towards?
Because you're kind of going one way or the other,
aren't you, in the Christian life.
Now, you might be slowly going backwards,
but I don't think you really stagnate.
You either keep going forward or you start going backwards.
It's kind of like a two-gear train, you know.
And there are your options.
He said in verse 13,
Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended,
but this one thing I do,
forgetting those things which are behind
and reaching forth unto those things which are before.
So he's talking about those past works of righteousness.
And there can be value in learning from the past, by the way.
Okay, so it's not, oh, well, forget it all, you know,
it doesn't matter.
Look, we can learn from the past.
Look, he's saying, look, I forget all that past stuff,
you know, I was trying to earn my way to heaven.
Yeah, look, there's nothing important about it.
But we can learn from mistakes, can't we?
We can learn from the past.
Good to remind yourself where you've come from.
I preached that sermon last year,
was don't forget where you came from.
Because, look, many can get complacent,
many can think, well,
and they start to find little things to moan and win,
and forget what the state of their spiritual life was
before there was a church, send them out soul winning,
you know, and not preaching a load of heresy
from behind the pulpit every week and the rest of it.
But, look, there's nothing wrong with learning from the past.
And, you know, I brought it up just briefly earlier
and I'll bring it up again.
I will keep preaching about the people
that got kicked out of this church, okay?
I will keep preaching it.
I'm not forgetting it.
We're not moving on,
because they're such a great lesson for us, okay?
And, look, do you have to name these people?
Look, sometimes I don't even bother,
because pretty much all of them were narcissists anyway,
so they'd probably get off on that anyway.
But, look, sometimes I will, sometimes I won't,
but Paul named people, didn't he?
Yeah, for us to learn, well, for eternity pretty much from,
yeah?
And there's something wrong,
and I'm going to keep doing that,
because we'll quickly forget.
People have short memories, okay?
And quits with time will just start to,
and the shock of it and the anger and the outrage
that many people felt, especially on that day here,
will slowly start to dissipate with people
and then they'll start to convince,
well, they weren't that bad, were they?
Well, you know, they must have just been a bit this
or maybe it was just that.
No, they were wicked, okay?
They were wicked and it needs preaching
about time and time again.
And they are a great example.
They're a great example.
It's not always going to be a positive message.
And some people, it might bug them,
because it's like, yeah,
I was kind of best friends with these people.
I hung out with these people.
I went to the sleepovers.
I went to the bar,
because I listened to them slagging you off
and whoever else in the church and everything else,
and I didn't say anything.
Yeah?
But that's a lesson we can all learn from that, can't we?
I saw them doing that.
I saw them trying to make this own clique,
this own force in the church.
I saw it and I didn't do anything.
Well, next time, hopefully you will.
But if we forget about it,
it will happen time and time again, won't it?
Look, it's not going to be every sermon every week,
but also there's a lot of stuff that needs preaching about,
because they were such a force
and there was so much that was constantly being pushed
on people in this church,
sometimes subtly, sometimes not so subtly,
around in all conversations, be it the covetousness,
be it the crazy parenting stuff,
be it all of this sort of weird behaviour,
that it needs preaching about as well.
Half the reason I've done a parenting series
is just to show you what the Bible says,
as opposed to whoever the latest,
whoever the best parent must be,
because they've got X amount of kids or something else.
Just bizarre stuff.
So a lot of this stuff will need preaching,
and we'll be hitting on things time and time again.
There's nothing wrong with learning from the past.
However, whilst doing that,
whilst we're learning from mistakes,
whilst we're learning from things that have happened,
we still want to be going forward, don't we?
We want to be reaching forward and setting our sights
on what we're going towards, right?
Are you still going forwards?
Is everyone here still going forwards
in their spiritual life?
You might think, well, I've knocked thousands of doors,
I've read the Bible ten times,
I've done whatever else it is,
but the higher you go up that slope,
the harder that fall down is, isn't it?
Yeah, the higher you reach,
look, the faster I think that backslide can be,
you know, because it's so easy,
it doesn't matter where you think you've got to in life,
you can still backslide at a crazy speed,
and that fall is hard, isn't it?
You don't have to turn to 1 Corinthians 10, 12,
it says, wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth
take heed lest he fall.
Look, it's easy to fall.
It doesn't matter how strong you think you are,
how spiritually mature you think you are,
how wise you think you are,
how much you think you've got it together,
how much you think you've achieved in the past,
you can fall, okay?
Everyone can fall.
We've got to keep reaching forth.
So, what are you reaching towards this year?
Now, before you start all going,
well, I've got a new exercise plan,
I've got to eat healthier, brother, here,
you know, whatever else it is.
Look, that's not what we're talking about,
there's nothing wrong with having some of those things,
there's nothing wrong with having some personal goals,
maybe like it's a tidier house,
maybe it's more me time or something, I don't know, yeah,
what about your spiritual life, though?
Have you set any realistic goals this year?
And look, I've never been a big fan of, you know,
I've just never really got into resolutions and goals
and things like that, but I think it can be effective,
you know, and it can be strong.
It's good to start the year, you know, it is a new year,
and nothing wrong with thinking about a new year,
and where does our candor come from?
Well, Jesus Christ, isn't it, you know?
And look, nothing wrong with setting some targets.
So, what sort of things could there be?
Well, how about a realistic goal with your Bible reading?
How about a realistic goal with your Bible reading?
How about, right, okay, I know I'm slacking,
I know that certain days I'm not reading it,
I'm only reading maybe one chapter, or I'm only doing this,
or maybe I'm not, whatever it is,
what's a realistic goal that you think you could do this year?
Maybe you could read it once through this year,
you've never read it once through,
or maybe it's taken you a long time to read it once through.
Or maybe you could read it twice through in a year,
maybe about a half hour a day.
Is that too much? Is that a lot?
It's 15 minutes a day, read it once through,
and approximately around about three chapters a day,
maybe a few extra when you're going through,
maybe some of the shorter psalms or shorter chapters
should make it in a year.
Reading the chapter through in a year,
you could do Bible reading plans if you want to do that,
that's up to you.
Twice in a year, maybe you're going for the big time,
four times in a year, an hour a day, how about that?
Can you do it?
Nothing wrong with it if you can,
don't want to skim read it,
but if you think that you can,
Bible memorization.
How about a goal,
well I'm going to at least do all the six verses
that we do each time with our Bible memory challenge each time.
How about I'm going to make sure I do that every time?
And then how about you add some more to that?
How about every time you read the Bible,
you take a verse, a favorite verse from it,
and you go, I'm going to memorize that?
Quite good, wouldn't it?
Yeah, Bible memorization I think is important.
How about your prayer life?
Maybe some people have got their Bible reading sorted,
but maybe their prayer life is lacking a bit.
How about you make some realistic goals with your prayer life?
Right, every morning I'm going to make sure I get up early,
I get down on my knees and I pray to God.
If you're all doing that, maybe add some more as well.
I mean look, you can pray as much as you like,
but add something that you think realistically
you can add into your day.
Last thing at night, first thing at morning,
maybe once in a day.
Are you praying good times when you're giving thanks for your food?
Pray to the Lord.
Are you praying with your families?
Are you praying multiple times in the day?
Soul winning, how about soul winning?
How about some goals for soul winning?
For some of you, maybe, oh well actually I'm doing all right,
I'm soul winning all right.
Well, do you feel that you've really got it nailed?
Are you still a little bit kind of stuttery,
maybe a little bit,
get a bit kind of confused where you're going next?
Or maybe you feel that your opening's a bit off sometimes.
You can practice that.
You can get that right.
You can practice and try.
It's an important thing to be good at, isn't it?
Yeah, it's the word of God that saves the course,
but there's nothing wrong with that work
when making sure that he's as prepared as possible.
The horse is prepared against the day of battle.
How about if it's not how you soul win,
how about it's going soul winning?
How about for those of you that maybe,
well, it's every now and again,
and I go kind of once a month on Sunday,
how about it's every Sunday?
How about adding a time in a week?
How about, well, actually, yeah, I could do another time.
I think I could realistically do that.
How about let me know
and we'll see if we could add another week time.
Maybe you can make one of the other times in the week.
Maybe you've never been soul winning before.
Maybe it's right.
I'm going to start getting out and being a silent partner
and seeing what it's all about.
Believe me, once you do it, it's not scary at all.
It's just getting it going in the first place,
which is a hard bit.
Or maybe it's becoming a talker.
Look, I've always said,
silent partners are as important.
We need silent partners.
But maybe you've been a silent partner for a while
and you do want to talk
and you feel like, no, I want to talk.
How about that?
Maybe make a goal for this year.
I'm going to talk by this time.
There are many goals you can make.
Midweek services, how about that one?
As is normal with churches,
our midweek services are quite a service.
It's busier than most churches in the country
on a midweek service,
yet it's still a quiet service.
How about, right, I'm going to start coming midweek.
I'm going to make away.
I'm going to try and work things out with my employer.
I'm going to do whatever it is.
I'm going to make some changes so I can come midweek.
How about that?
Look, the services aren't here just for a laugh.
It's important, isn't it?
How about church attendance in general?
Maybe for some it's a bit of a kind of extra.
Maybe there are people watching online right now
or maybe later in the week who church attendance is kind of,
well, you know, it's as and when.
At least I can sit at home and tell myself I'm going to church.
It's not the same, okay?
Online isn't the same.
I was talking to a brother about this on Wednesday night
who had come on a Wednesday,
usually watches from home for other reasons
why he can't make it on a Wednesday.
He said it's entirely different.
It's completely different to sit here in the room
with the Holy Spirit hearing the preaching live,
worshipping God together, hearing the Bible reading here,
et cetera, okay?
It's a different ball game, yeah?
God says not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together.
He doesn't say don't forsake the watching online
of yourselves together, okay?
So maybe it's that.
Maybe it's church attendance.
Maybe it's turning up to both services on a Sunday.
Maybe it's coming midweek.
Maybe it's just getting here in the first place.
Maybe it's breaking the duck and you've been watching from afar
and just getting to church, okay?
No, church is, that's the most important thing of the week.
It's the first day of the week.
Sunday is, everything else comes after that.
Everything else works around it.
That's the attitude we should have, yeah?
And I know for many it's not so easy,
but that's a goal, isn't it?
Maybe you can make a goal for that of this year.
Maybe there's a sin in your life.
These are all much more important for me than your exercise routine,
much more important than whatever diet you want to go on,
much more important than many of the resolutions people will do out there.
Maybe there's a sin that you know is affecting you.
You know it's affecting your life, affecting your family,
affecting whatever it is.
Maybe there's a sin that you need to get a hold of,
that you need to go, right, no, I'm squashing that.
It's January the 1st.
I'm going to have a good year and I'm going to get rid of that sin
which is affecting my life.
Maybe it's preaching.
Maybe some of you men out there, fancy a men's preaching night,
thinking, yeah, I could do that, you know, I fancy that.
And like I've said before, if I have more than one,
if I have two or more, we'll happily do a private beginners men's preaching night
which you can have your own private video for.
It doesn't have to be live on YouTube.
Just let me know.
You think, yeah, I wouldn't mind that.
I wouldn't mind preaching.
Maybe that's something you'd like to do.
Again, no pressure with that.
You might decide, I never want to preach, and that's up to you.
Maybe it's certain things.
Maybe it's with families, family devotional time.
Maybe you're not doing that so much.
Maybe you're not teaching your kids so much.
Maybe some mums here maybe aren't really getting Christ
and the Bible into their day with the kids as much as they'd like to.
There's many things we can do on there,
and that's just off the top of my head when I made some notes.
Verse 14, he said,
I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Right, pressing toward, reaching forth, he said in the verse before.
These give the picture of some effort, don't they?
Some striving.
That's why he's talking about, for me,
he's talking about those rewards he's looking to earn.
He's talking about doing great things for God, yeah?
Press means to urge forward with force, okay?
This isn't comfort zone Christianity we're talking about here, okay?
Press toward.
This is talking about there's some force, there's some urgency with it.
This isn't sort of just relaxing and doing well, you know,
because there is a world's version of Christianity in churches
where it's like pat on the back time.
It's a social club.
Well, what are you getting?
Did you have a lovely service?
Did you come out feeling like you really, you know, heard some nice stuff
and you really felt warm and cosy afterwards?
Look, sometimes you need that,
but often you need to come out and feel like you've had a kick up the bum.
You need to come out and feel like you've just been slapped round the face
and told, sort yourself out.
And you need to be strong enough to deal with that as well, don't you?
Because it's one thing to take it and to come here and take it,
it's another thing to then respond to that and not go,
well, I'm not doing that because he told me to.
How dare he?
You know, we had someone who was here before he was not here anymore,
he said to my wife, they find it very hard being told what to do by a man.
They've got some issues with that,
because it's like, what on earth is wrong with you?
So you've got to be strong enough to be told what to do by a man
from behind the pulpit and say, get right.
Get right with God.
Get on with life and do what God wants you to do in life, yeah?
And get rid of that sin out of your life and get right.
And, you know, you've got to be able to deal with that.
You've got to press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling
of God in Christ Jesus.
Now, pressing is a term used in football.
And, look, I like football.
I don't like watching football,
or I don't like watching at least high-level football,
because it's full of queers, okay?
And the whole thing is a queer away, it's rainbow laces.
I mean, my brother was telling me, I didn't watch any of the World Cup,
my brother was telling me, you know, it was just full-on.
They were trying to find anyone they could that looked a bit queer,
any presenter, they just, you know, it would either be a woman
or someone who looked as effeminate as possible.
He said the BBC coverage was just this massive sod fest,
or an attempted sod fest, because there was all this issue, apparently,
with Qatar not allowing open sodomy or anything else.
I mean, really, they should have been banning closed sodomy as well,
shouldn't they?
But I think they reduce it to, well, no, public affection or something else.
Anyway, regardless, but I do like low-level football.
And I take my son to football, and I like watching that sort of thing.
I used to enjoy watching the game of football, yeah?
And I like the tactics of football.
And there's something that's called pressing in football.
And basically, a high-pressing game as a defending team,
so when you haven't got the ball,
is basically to be aggressive with trying to win it back.
And it's trying to press towards the team that have the ball,
instead of sitting back with maybe like guarding your goal type thing,
with like maybe in the old days, it'd be like two banks of four at the back.
Instead, they would be pressing forward into the opposition's half
and trying to get the ball.
And it's basically an offensive way of defending.
So you don't have the ball, you're theoretically defending,
but you're offensively trying to win back the ball.
And it puts pressure on the team.
And in young kids' football, I mean, it's brilliant.
So, you know, where Jack plays, they'll have...
I mean, if it's a goal-kick,
sometimes it's better than getting a corner
to literally kick it off the pitch
because some of those little kids can't kick it that fast.
Then the goalkeeper has the ball
and, you know, your whole team just like presses them
and they go, ah, I don't know where to kick it.
And suddenly you get like goalscoring opportunities off a goal-kick
because of pressing, because it's an offensive way of defending, yeah?
And it made me think about this with the Christian life as well,
like pressing towards something, pressing forward,
that offensive way, that offensive way of defending,
an offensive way of being in the Christian life is a great way,
you know, offensive-defensive work, basically,
is a great way of getting those goals,
is winning for the Lord,
is reaching those things that we want to reach,
getting those goals, maybe whether it's your New Year goals,
maybe it's the goals of the church,
but it's about putting effort in, isn't it?
It's putting work in because a high-pressing game is hard work.
You're chasing down every ball,
you're running after the opposition every time they have it,
you're not just sitting back and relaxing
and waiting for them to pass it around.
It's hard work, but it gets results
and it gets you to win those goals.
But we have to, the Christian life,
we have to think about putting some effort into it, don't we?
It is effort and it's no good going,
well, I put some effort in last year.
You've got to keep putting in effort year after year after year
and you might think, but it's tiring, I'm tired, I'm getting older,
I'm getting weary, I'm not getting so much sleep,
work's whatever else, but it's only short,
it's a vapour, isn't it?
This life is so short and you don't want to look back in heaven
and go, I could have done more, I really could have done more,
I could have pressed on more,
I could have put in some more effort to get that ball and get that goal.
Turn to Daniel 12, reaching and pressing forward.
We reach for it and we press forward to get it.
So what are some marks that SFBC UK is reaching and pressing towards in 2023?
OK, so Daniel 12-3.
Daniel 12-3, you're turning to, says this.
And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament
and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars forever and ever.
OK, so goal number one is a thousand salvations, OK?
That's my goal for this year.
I want this church to get a thousand salvations.
We got rid of the clowns, OK?
The clowns are gone, so it's going to be harder,
because we're not going to have the kind of,
well, I bullied a ten-year-old into saying what I wanted him to say.
OK, we've got rid of that rubbish, we got rid of the,
I had ten salvations today, who do I tell?
You know, and things like this.
We got rid of all that stuff, OK?
So that means we're going to have to put in some work, OK?
We've got less people here anyway,
but we're going to be getting real salvation.
So you need to put some work in for real salvation.
Look, for me it's not come back and, oh, wow, just so great,
because, brother, whoever's coming back,
and they just keep saying they've got six or seven salvations.
I ain't interested in that.
What I want is people to get thorough salvation.
I want a thousand real thorough proper salvations
with people that you come back and go, yeah, I'm confident,
I'm really confident, as much as I can be,
that person got saved, yeah, as much as possible.
I did all I could with that person for them to get saved,
not for them to just agree with me and listen to me, OK?
Remember, we want them to choose to put their faith in Christ,
not to be bullied into saying they're putting their faith in Christ.
We want them to do completely different things.
A thousand salvations. How can you help as a church?
How can we all help to get those thousand salvations?
Soul winning times. Turn up to the soul winning times.
Look, there are soul winning times that you'll have a captain leading
week in, week out from this church.
Get involved with them. Turn up.
Turn up to the marathons.
Yeah, the marathons, we'll be back to once a month through the marathons.
We have a nice meal afterwards.
But turn up to them. Get involved.
Be part of it and come and get some people saved.
The marathons are great for it because the marathons are generally receptive.
OK, we go to receptive areas, receptive places, and we put some time and effort in
and get many people to say, I love the marathons.
I love going to these places. It's so refreshing, isn't it, as well?
Turn to Matthew chapter 28.
So number one is a thousand salvations.
Matthew 28 and verse 19.
A famous verse of the Bible says this.
Matthew 28, 19.
Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.
OK, my next goal is 30 baptisms this year.
I would like to get 30 baptisms this year.
I'll tell you what, that will be hard.
And I'll tell you why.
You go, wait a second, didn't we have like 80 something or whatever it was?
Well, it's actually been 24 each year without Poland.
So if you take away the Poland trip, there was 24 the first year and 24 the second year.
OK, and they were baptized at the church.
Now, the first year had a lot of people that were waiting to get baptized as well.
So, in fact, it was theoretically, you could say less,
because now we're looking for people, newer people coming into this church to get them baptized.
My goal is 30, which is over two a month.
OK, and well, how do you help with that?
Look, you encourage them to get baptized, OK?
We are told to baptize them.
We are told to get people baptized and we get them saved.
We want to get them baptized.
I hope everyone here, the second or not the second,
but it's within the same conversation of when they've just called on the name of the Lord
and you start to give them, hopefully you're giving them a Bible,
you're giving them a DVD, you're giving them a follow-up sheet.
I hope then you start talking about baptism, OK?
Because we are told to baptize them, yeah?
Get them along to church, we'll baptize them.
And if you're not baptized here and you're saved, you're commanded to be baptized, OK?
You should be getting baptized.
That's what God wants you to do after salvation is to get baptized.
So we need to be encouraging people to get baptized.
I have a goal of 30 this year.
Verse 20, he said there,
Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you,
and lo, I am with you always, even until the end of the world. Amen.
He said, teaching them to observe all things.
OK, number three is more first-time visitors.
Now, I don't have a number on that, OK?
I don't have a number,
but I just want to get more and more first-time visitors into this church.
I want to get more and more people that have got saved into this church,
get them involved.
Now, obviously God builds a church, yeah?
However, for him to build our church, we can help with that, can't we?
We can be more welcoming as a church, can't we?
We can be a better environment for him to bring in people that maybe are more fragile.
We can not be a load of holier-than-thals when they come in, yeah?
Because God's not going to bring people that maybe are delicate to this church
for us to destroy them if you're walking around trying to show off
or act like you're so spiritual or pick out, point out problems.
And I'm not saying anyone does that.
But if people are inclined to do that stuff,
we aren't going to get those people at this church, OK?
To get those first-time people, we have to be a church which is able to disciple
and be welcoming to first-time people, OK?
And that's not by being the gnat, straining, camel-swallowing types
and everything else, yeah?
OK, so we want to be welcoming, we want to be helpful when they're here.
How else do we encourage that?
Well, make it tidy.
You know, that's something we need to be on top of as well.
You know, you have someone come along.
We want people to come along after soul-winning.
On a Sunday afternoon, they walk in and everyone's stuff just strewn everywhere.
If people have stayed behind, there's kids' toys all over the place,
food all over the floor, et cetera.
We don't want that. I'm not saying that does happen.
But it's something we need to make sure we're on top of.
It has happened before.
We want to make sure that the church is tidy, welcoming,
it looks ready for an afternoon.
So that's a great time to get people around.
You go out soul-winning on a Sunday, come to church,
we've got an evening service, 4pm.
Is God going to encourage people that are maybe delicate
and maybe are new to the faith and could easily be put off it
if they turn up and people are like,
oh, why aren't you wearing a dress or something else?
You know, I'm sure no one would do that.
But stuff like that does happen, yeah?
OK, we want to make sure we're welcome,
we want to make sure that we're a welcoming environment.
Also with that as well, the way our world is,
it's an online world, isn't it?
Yes, there's a lot of online stuff.
Look, we have a channel on YouTube, yeah?
We have a channel on YouTube.
I would like to do an advertisement for our Rumble channel,
which is going to be our backup for if and when that kind of ends,
the YouTube channel.
We have a Facebook channel, which only has our preaching on it.
We're just in the process of making some shorter clips
and stuff like that as well.
We want to get the word out here, there's less now,
sadly there's less of the great preaching on YouTube and stuff
because a lot of channels got ended and everything else.
So, look, spread our channel, come on it, like it, share it,
get people involved.
Look, you might not like, you might,
oh, I didn't like that sermon, well, maybe someone else will, yeah?
Maybe you might not like my preaching,
but maybe someone else will, OK?
Yeah, I'm not Pastor Anderson, I'm not Pastor Jimenez,
but I'll tell you what, we're preaching here stuff
which no-one else is preaching in the UK, yeah?
I don't hear anyone else preaching some of the truths of this day,
I don't hear them preaching this stuff.
So get the truth out, some people don't want to hear it from you,
some people don't want to hear it from the US,
they want to hear it from someone in England,
they want to hear it from their own nation,
get it out there, share it, like it, get involved,
get involved, if you want to, get involved in the comments,
it's great fun.
Poor John Cornell's on his own with that most of the time.
Get involved and look, you know, share stuff, like stuff,
invite people to the church.
Look, loads of you have social media accounts,
use them for the church, or is it about you?
Is it about your own, you know, well, I've just kind of, you know,
I can give them my own views and post my own comments
and do my own stuff, but isn't it about the church?
Isn't that what we want, to grow this church?
Isn't this church doing a great thing,
or is it about what you're doing in life?
Use your social media accounts for it.
Turn to Hebrews chapter 10.
So number one was a thousand salvations,
Number three, more first-time visitors.
Hebrews 10 and verse 24 says,
Hebrews 10 and 24 let us consider one another to provoke unto love
unto good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together
as a manner of summies, but exhorting one another
and so much more as you see the day approaching.
Okay, number four is to beat our attendance record.
I want to beat our attendance record.
Brother Ian, you just keep kicking people out.
You're not really doing the right thing.
No, I'm doing the right thing.
Yeah, we kick the bad people out
and we want the good people to come in then, yeah?
Okay, 85 and 82 was in the old building.
In this building, it was 76 and 75,
so their morning and evening attendance.
So 85 was our record.
It is our record, by the way,
because that's what our church record's been for a morning service in 82.
Here so far, that's the first target to beat
was when Pastor Thompson was here,
was 76 in the morning, 75 in the evening.
Okay, I want to beat those,
the first one to go for was the 76,
now I want to go for the 85, yeah?
And how are we going to do that? How can you help with that?
Get involved. Look, if you're watching online,
get involved with our church.
If you're here and unless you're ill, you should be at church.
If you can make it here, you should be at church, yeah?
Okay, make sure you're at church.
Get in church, get to church,
put church first and you'll then be an example to others.
Because, look, it's very easy.
People, look, the flesh doesn't want to be at church
and people will look around in a church
and this is what people do and they'll go,
well, brother so-and-so or sis,
you know, they only come to the morning service.
Why do I have to come as well to the evening?
Or they only come to the whatever.
Well, they don't come midweek or they don't come whatever.
Look, what you do, that's why it says here,
it says, exhorting one another and so much the more.
When you're just in church alone, you're encouraging others.
You're encouraging others to be at church.
When you have someone that's just in church come rain or shine,
barring illness, is just in church,
it encourages the rest of the church to do the same.
Okay, be a part of that. Be in church.
Look, Sunday, give the day to the Lord.
Look, Sunday morning, Sunday,
look, we don't expect you to stay in Wickford until 7pm.
Like many churches, we'll have a 7pm evening service.
And it's not just for a laugh
and for those that can't come in the morning.
The morning and evening service
is because there's so much to preach out in the Bible, okay?
I'm not preaching the same sermon
for those that can't come in the morning, okay?
I'm preaching a different type of sermon in the evening.
I'm preaching a different type of sermon on a Wednesday
and different messages, there's different preaching,
there's different hymns being sung,
there's different stuff going on.
Look, it's all edifying and it all requires you to be there.
Yeah? And, you know, three times a week,
look, they were meeting every day at the early church in Acts,
daily in the temple and in every house.
We're not asking you to meet every day.
But we are saying, look, there's three services,
make them your priority in life.
Now, you make your priority,
you'll have more and more people who start to feel that as well.
And then you start to get more of an atmosphere in the church
and people want to be there for that, yeah?
And people want to be involved and be part of that
and not be the one that's not there, okay?
So, and if you're not here and you're online,
get involved, get involved in the church.
Find a way, find a way.
Look, you have one life, one life to live.
And if it means moving closer to the church,
I'm not going to tell anyone they have to do that.
I would encourage that, though.
Look, and again, this isn't, look,
there are people that have done much more for Christianity than myself.
I'm not some sort of benchmark.
However, I did move house and I did give up a business
and I gave up our life and moved closer to where I thought the church
at the time we thought we were going to be in the area where we moved to
and it's still a lot closer for me here.
It's not because I'm this great person or anything.
I'm not trying to say that.
It's because thank God that he put it on my heart to put the things of God first.
And me and my wife, we sat down and we said, let's do this.
And look, everyone else is capable of making an effort for God.
You don't have to.
I'm not going to think badly of you if you don't,
but God wants us in church.
For me, it's more important than owning a house.
It's more important than the best job I can get.
It's more important than, you know, the neighbourhood
where I just always wanted to be or anything else.
For me, it's make sure I can get to church, yeah?
Okay, so beat our attendance record.
Number four, turn to Mark 16.
Mark 16 and verse 15.
Oh no, these are famous verses of the Bible
and many of you know these verses,
but they're strong verses of the Bible.
He said in Mark 16, 15, and he said unto them,
go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.
He said, go ye into all the world.
So number five, number five is
I want to do a soul winning trip to Northern Ireland this year.
Okay, so I want to start getting out to Northern Ireland.
There's a group of brethren out in Northern Ireland
who are regularly, they faithfully attend their churches there.
They're soul winning, they're meeting up.
They've got a lot about, for me they remind me of the group
that we had here, hopefully with a few less of the wicked ones.
But they're just people that are just faithfully serving,
faithfully soul winning.
There's a few strong families there as well.
They've been fellowshipping for a while now.
I'd like to go out there and do a soul winning trip,
hopefully in the springtime.
As soon as I've got a date for that, I'll let you guys know.
I'd like to get as many of the church out there,
get there and start meeting these guys and fellowshipping with them
with a view, hopefully, to getting something going out there.
So I'd like to turn them ideally, hopefully,
into a soul winning group for us out there
and hopefully into a satellite church at some point in the future as well.
Nothing's promised, we'll see what happens with them.
You know, they know that as well.
There's a lot of ifs and buts there.
However, first things first, we want to get out there and soul win.
We want to get out there, meet them, go soul winning,
encourage them, baptise who needs baptising
and have a good little couple of day trip out there.
We're looking to do that in springtime.
How can you help?
Well, firstly, make time for that.
If you'd like to get involved with that, make some time.
Make that something that you can do
and try and find the time to do that.
But also pray, pray for them.
Pray for them because, look, as we know,
from when 65 people, Lord, it was about 65 met up
for the first mega-marathon in London,
there was a tax left, right and centre with that.
There were wicked people getting slung out of what sacrament.
There was all sorts going on.
Look, we need to pray for them because it's not easy
and there's many people around the world that kind of sometimes
almost feel like, well, they just should have a church.
Well, there's a couple of us, we go soul winning.
You know, can someone plant the church here?
But it's not as simple as that, is it?
Look, there's a lot against a proper church,
going out soul winning, doing things properly.
It's a lot against that working and happening.
We need to pray for them, pray for that group out there,
make time to be able to get out there.
And last bit here, in Mark 16, 15,
number five of the soul winning trip to Northern Ireland.
And he said in verse 15, he said unto them,
Go ye into all the world and preach your gospel
to every creature, every creature.
Last goal for the year for me is I would like to start
getting involved with some local retirement homes.
So I would like to start a preaching ministry to retirement homes.
I would like to, if possible, and I know this one,
I don't want to put this as a set goal because I reckon it's going to be hard.
I would like to, if possible, find whether it's youth groups.
I think schools will be hard.
I don't know just based on the fact of the sort of church we are, etc.
It might be difficult, but I'd like to find a way as well
of getting to some of the youngsters with permission
and preaching the gospel to them.
But the retirement homes as well is good.
And something with that I'd like to do is try and get a ministry going
without where we start to, I'm going to start contacting
some local retirement homes.
And what I need for that is men who are happy to,
maybe it will be once a month or something else,
to go there and preach.
And obviously we'll start with the gospel there,
but after that if it's something regular,
for me the way I see it is first time will be the gospel
and then repeated trips will be short sermons
depending on what we can agree with the specific homes and stuff.
Obviously they've got nothing to lose really.
We're just going to come for free preach and get involved,
bring a few Bibles and everything else for them.
But it's something I'd like to do this year.
We are told to preach the gospel to every preacher.
When you go and knock on those doors you ain't getting in are you?
Let's be honest, you knock and you see it's a retirement home.
A lot of the time you just have to move on don't you?
Well yeah, come in and start knocking on everyone's doors.
It doesn't really work does it?
So that's something that we are told to do.
That's something I'd like to do.
I think it would be great for the men as well to,
those that want to preach in the future as well,
to practice their preaching, get out there and preach
to different crowds and stuff as well.
So that's something I'd like to do.
How can you help with that?
Pray again, pray for doors to be open with that literally.
And pray also for things to work out for us to kind of,
ideally get those doors open to places that are going to be receptive,
which are going to want to hear the word of God.
There's going to be, look, in my experience,
from when I was first saved and, look,
I went to an evangelical church for a little bit
and the only people that were saved there were the elderly.
And there are elderly people that are saved out there
and they're stuck in retirement homes in other places.
They're not hearing any of the word of God.
And you might think well it's not like they can go out soul winning.
Yeah, but you know what, they can still preach it.
They can still learn how to preach the gospel as well.
They can still get encouraged in life.
They still need the word of God, don't they?
Yeah, and let's be honest, half those carers,
they aren't going to be encouraging them with the word of God.
So look, they still need that.
We want to give them that.
So that's something I'd like to get on with as well.
So pray and sharpen up for preaching then as well.
You think actually, yeah, I like the idea of that.
Like I said, happy to do beginner preaching nights.
Just let me know anyone that wants to do that.
I'm not going to just keep going on about it.
If and when anyone wants to do one, let me know.
I'd like to do one.
I'll get a couple of you together.
Agree on time, we'll come down.
It'll be a men's little preaching evening.
And those of you that are already preaching,
keep doing the men's preaching nights.
Keep getting involved.
There'll be more chances to preach here as well.
And we'll try and get something going with the retirement homes as well.
So there were six goals.
Number one is a thousand salvations.
Number two, 30 baptisms.
Number three, more first time visitors.
Number four, beat our attendance record.
Number five, a soul winning trip to Northern Ireland.
And number six, retirement homes and ideally,
hopefully some form of schools and young people groups preaching.
Go back to Philippians 3.
And do you know what else we need to achieve all of this?
We need willing workers, people that want to serve, yeah?
People that just want to serve.
Lively stones, not to be seen of men.
Not, well, I want to serve as long as I'm seen doing it.
Not for ambition.
Well, I want to serve so that I can make it in whatever my ambition is.
Not to embarrass others.
Well, I want to serve because then I can like show up other people
and make them feel rubbish that they're not doing what I'm doing.
But to serve God, just because you want to serve God.
You want to put some effort in.
You want to reach forward, yeah?
You want to press on.
So what we need, we need people happy to muck in, don't we?
People that are just happy because there is other stuff.
Look, the busier and more populous church gets,
there's going to be more cleaning to do.
There's going to be more stuff to fix.
There's going to be more stuff to do out the front
to make it look nicer and more welcoming.
There's going to be more stuff to do.
There is more stuff already to do that I can't do.
We need help.
We need people that just want to do stuff, want to get stuck in,
want to muck in, want to offer up time.
I would like to do a probably beginning of the year
sort of big clean of the church as well to make it then a bit easier
so it doesn't feel like for the ladies after a service
that it's just where do you even start, you know?
And then we can maybe give it a real thorough clean
and make it look a bit nicer and everything else.
That's something I'd like to do as well.
We need just people happy to help out,
happy to just keep the place looking neat and tidy,
pick up a bit of rubbish when you see it,
put your cups in the bin, wash up your coffee cups, tea cups,
just stuff that just takes time off then myself, my wife,
at the end of the day or before the next service
and just helps us then plan and do more things for the Lord.
And keeping to the rules, and everyone here is good with that,
but I just don't want it to creep up.
We want things done decently and in order here.
So we don't want all this sort of,
well, I can get away with this and I can do this and do that.
We just want a functioning, proper, good, solid church,
people that are just ready to serve, want to do things, want to be here.
And just last point on that, it's not supposed to be easy, is it?
It's not.
It's not supposed to be easy.
No one said the Christian life was easy, did they?
How are you doing?
Verse 13 again, just last bit in Philippians 3.
Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended,
but this one thing I do,
forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forth
unto those things which are before,
I press toward the mark
for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.
Pressing, reaching, this requires some effort, OK?
We want to put the effort in,
put the effort in, and we're going to reap the rewards, aren't we?
OK, and that was reaching pressing into 2023.
They're my goals for the year.
I hope you all have some individual goals for the year as well.
And on that, we're going to pray.
Father, thank you.
Thank you for this church.
Thank you for your word.
Thank you for, you know, just making it clear how you want us to live,
how you want us to serve you, how you want us to behave.
The sort of things that we should,
that should be important in our lives
and for the right reasons.
And you make that clear, Lord,
and help us to just be clear with that in our heads,
clear with that in our hearts, to just want to serve you,
to just want to make your church thrive,
not for our own sort of ends, not for our own ambitions,
just for you, for, you know, for the cause of Christ,
to get the gospel out, to build people up, to change lives, Lord,
to make individuals and families just stronger
and a better testimony,
and with that, to just encourage more and more people to go out
and get more and more people saved, Lord.
We thank you that we have this church here.
We thank you for giving us this church.
Help us to have a great year, Lord, going ahead.
Help us to have a great lunch now as well as it comes
and just help us to then get back and have a great afternoon service.
Jesus, I am thrilled with this. Amen.